It’s Josepha, the high priestess of vote-getting

EVEN after all this time, the name of the venue immediately caught my eye. It is pushing on for 40 years since I made my Confirmation at the Church of St Thérèse in Mount Merrion on Dublin’s southside.

I was back there again on a bitterly cold day in March 1998 to report on Dermot Morgan’s funeral, which sticks in my mind for a number of reasons. Though I didn’t know Dermot, we had a number of mutual friends who were there as mourners. I remember feeling slightly awkward standing there with notebook and pen in hand as they arrived to pay their last respects.

Unless my memory is playing tricks on me, there was also a representative of the Dublin Archdiocese distributing copies of a printed statement on Morgan’s death. It could have been a scene out of Father Ted. Talk about life imitating art.

Now that same church building is back in the headlines because of the extraordinary row that has broken out between Culture Minister Josepha Madigan and the hierarchy. Frankly, no one comes out of this smelling of roses.

For his part, Archbishop Diarmuid Martin has been a largely benign and uncontroversial presence since he was appointed to the post almost a decade and a half ago. Years spent working in the Vatican left him with more refined diplomatic skills and better political antennae than other senior clerical figures in this country. But his response to Ms Madigan’s intervention suggests that the mask has perhaps slipped at last.

Nor has Fr Brian O’Reilly, one of the priests in the Mount Merrion parish, exactly covered himself in glory. ‘If you can’t live by it, you don’t have to live by it,’ he said of people who object to some of the Catholic Church’s more arcane and anachronistic rules. ‘No one forces anybody to be a Catholic.’

Which, as Fr O’Reilly knows full well, is a moot point when the Church still maintains a dominant presence in the education system. But that’s an argument for another day.

Let’s just recap on what exactly led to this unseemly dispute. Due to an unfortunate mix-up, no clergyman turned up to celebrate the Saturday evening service.

So La Madigan stepped up to the altar and led the congregation in prayers. Next thing we know, she is all over the media saying it is a ‘sad reflection of the times we live in that there are no priests available to say Saturday evening Mass in one of the busiest parishes in Dublin’.

Now I am willing to accept that she was unaware at that point that the noshow was simply a mistake. We’ll give her that. From what I can see, though, there are a few possible scenarios regarding what led her up to the altar in the first place. Forgive me for sounding like a cynic, but one option is that she immediately spotted a chance to get her mug into the papers promoting the cause of women priests. But let’s give her the benefit of the doubt and assume there was no ulterior motive at all. That still doesn’t paint her in a particularly flattering light, though.

Even if she does regularly do one of the readings at Mass, what possessed her to think it was correct protocol to effectively step into the priest’s shoes? Such behaviour smacks of arrogance and attentionseeking. The sensible thing would have been to go home and come back the following morning.

But, of course, it is always a mistake to expect a politician to behave like a normal person. They’re a different breed to the rest of us.

I remember hearing a joke about a well-known entertainer – Bob Hope, I think – and his addiction to showbusiness. The punchline was that every time he opened the fridge and the light came on, he immediately started do a 15-minute routine. Politicians are like that, too. And the Minister looks like a woman increasingly in love with the limelight.

For what it is worth, I’m strongly of the opinion that there should be nothing to stop women being ordained as priests if that is what they want. But anyone who thinks La Madigan has done the cause a favour is sorely mistaken.

At the very least, this was a pathetic attempt to show off to fellow church-goers who also happen, of course, to be her constituents.

There is no proof that she went into this with the intention of making political capital out of it.

But I’d be astonished if she didn’t think getting up on the altar might bring in a few extra votes next time around.

Even in the House of God, no TD worth their salt ever misses a chance to ingratiate themselves with the electorate.

Two words spring to mind when it comes to Josepha Madigan and this particular stunt. One is ‘opportunist’. And the other is ‘grubby’.